Hey!
This was one great event. We had a blast and learned so much about the birds, natural history, and agricultural characteristics of the Columbia Basin. Keep this festival in mind for next year all you Westside folks. EAstern Washington in the spring is really lovely and if you aren't familiar with the potholes and scablands, you've really missed a lot.

Sunday in a wonderfully wide-ranging tour by Columbia NRW Biologist Randy Hill, we saw 55 speciesof birds, best of which were:


Huge flocks of Sandhill Cranes (0f course)
American Avocets
Prairie Falcon
Canada Goose nesting high, high on a ledge of a great basalt cliff
Every duck you can name, almost
Black Necked Stilts
Immature Bald Eagle right overhead
Long-Billed Curlew
Great-Horned Owl on nest
TWO Burrowing Owls posing by the side of the road

Plus:
Washington Ground Squirrel (endangered)
Yellow-Bellied Marmot (not endangered)
Painted Turtles (it is really spring)

The folks in Othello put on a pretty great show. Thanks to everyone there.

Caroline Feiss
Madrona Neighborhood, Seattle
mailto:cfeiss at halycon.com